NHS England told Pulse that since the GP Forward View launched in April 2016, 594 mental health workers have been recruited to the IAPT programme.

An NHS England spokesperson said: ‘We are already seeing progress in many areas of the country with 594 extra therapists in December 2017, which is in line with GPFV commitment.’

They added that CCGs ‘are starting from varying baselines in joining up mental and physical health services’, but added that NHS England is ‘monitoring progress, as CCGs across England recruit and train more therapists’.

The scheme – worth £122m – will see a further four recruitment waves through to February 2019.

NHS England said: ‘As at 31 December 2017, NHS Digital report 1,009 clinical pharmacists – or 658 FTE – were actively working in general practice, an increase of 734 (490 FTE) since September 2015.

‘The approved applications across phase one and two of the clinical pharmacist programme mean nearly 34m patients across circa 3000 practices will benefit from improved GP services.’

They added that NHS England is ‘on track to spend the £112m in full’.

Dr Richard Vautrey, chair of the BMA's GP Committee, told Pulse: 'Whilst any additional recruitment to an expanded primary care team is welcome, even those practices that have benefitted from new staff have big concerns about the sustainability of the schemes as there is no recurrent funding to support these initiatives.

'Investing properly in pharmacists in every practice is an obvious way to reduce medicine related adverse incidents and by doing so not only save lives but also potentially reduce costs for the NHS. There is, therefore, an urgent need to identify recurrent funding to support a much wider roll-out.'